


Part and Pull

by chocolattea



Category: Moana (2016)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-25
Updated: 2018-02-25
Packaged: 2019-03-23 16:51:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13791996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chocolattea/pseuds/chocolattea
Summary: The Big Bad is defeated, and Moana is going home. Her people – her family – call out to her, as strong a pull as the sea and just as indelible a part of her. Maui watches her stare off into the distance, and knows that this time, she isn’t thinking of wind and waves, but home and hearth."What about you?" she asks. "What will you do now?"





	Part and Pull

They stand on a grassy knoll on Te Fiti’s slumbering form, side by side, watching the sun make its ascent. The skies are clear, and even the dark clouds around the barrier islands are retreating.

The Big Bad is defeated, and Moana is going home. Her people – her family – call out to her, as strong a pull as the sea and just as indelible a part of her. Maui watches her stare off into the distance, and knows that this time, she isn’t thinking of wind and waves, but home and hearth.

“What about you?” she asks, squinting up at Maui through the sun's early glint. “What will you do now?”

“Oh, you know. Fish for islands, beat up giant eels. Just your everyday hero stuff,” Maui says casually.

She rolls her eyes, and ambushes him with a hug. Her arms barely reach his sides, let alone actually wrap around him, but it is a hug all the same. Maui doesn’t quite know what to do with it.

The Mini-Maui on his chest tattoo prods him.  _Hug back, dummy._

Moana squeaks, startled, when he lifts her up. He grins.

“Don’t go starting anymore magical disasters,” she says, trying to sound stern while dangling mid-air, it’s totally not cute.

“Yeah, yeah.” Maui smirks. “Try not to miss me too much, girly.”

“What? I’m not going to miss you at all!” Moana huffs, wriggling in his grasp. “Put me down, you big lump,” she commands.

Maui grins and sets her down slowly. Very, very slowly. As soon as she lands, she whacks him in the chest; she’s glaring, but there is no real heat to it.

Gods, he’s going to miss this. She’s so much fun to toy with, so excitable and responsive to teasing.

###

The sun has to rise eventually, and soon its time to leave and be left. 

Maui grips his fish hook, and its carvings light up in response. Magic swirls and spreads through him, bringing power and possibility curling into every inch of his being. It is a rush, a sense of being able to do and to be anything and everything.

Maui beckons it, and it obliges, spurring the familiar shrinks and growths of man to eagle.

He sets aflight with a forceful burst of wing, and the grasses shudder where he leaves. He circles up and into the air, climbing closer to the sun with each breath. Ascending. He spreads his wings wide; they catch the current, the air trickling beneath his feathers, and he tucks his legs in and soars.

He is well in the air when he turns back to look at Moana.

She grins and waves at him, like a cheerful palm tree swaying in the wind. 

Maui puffs up his chest and ruffles his feathers. Then, he swerves, going momentarily off-course, and his wings beat furiously as he draws loops and curls in the air.

He is rewarded with her laughter, clear and bright. The wind seizes the sound, and carries it up and along, as if it were part of the air itself. It stays with him, even as he straightens his course and flies on, the island becoming but a speck of dust on the horizon.

###

Maui has little experience with goodbyes, but he thinks this one went pretty well. Supposedly, it isn’t for forever; Moana had made him promise to visit, though even if she hadn’t, he suspects he could not so easily forget her.

She won’t forget him. Probably. He’s kind of hard to forget. Still, myths and legends do die, losing urgency in the face of mortals’ daily lives. Moana’s responsibilities as chief-to-be will take over eventually. She belongs with, belongs to, her people, and Maui knows, sure as the sea, that he will eventually fade back into nothing more than legend.

He supposes that it’s where he belongs: in neither realm of mortals nor paradise of gods, but rather the barely-believed words of distant legend. He is consigned to be more story than being, at once elevated and reduced to tale-worthy deeds. 

Grandiose acts are what he has, and so they are what he pursues. 

Te Fiti may have healed, but Maui isn’t naive enough to think that everything has suddenly become all right. The corruption may have stopped, but the rotted bits of land and sea still remain, bits that need to be cut away in order for them to begin to recover. It will, frankly, take forever and be a huge pain in the ass, but hey, he is Maui and he is a legend.


End file.
